Cadet Teaching Brochure, Farmington State Normal School, ca. 1944

Due to a serious teacher shortage in the 1940s, the Maine Department of Education devised a Cadet Teaching Program to help fill the need for teachers in rural schools which might otherwise be forced to close. Cadet Teaching Centers were established throughout Maine and students from the State's Normal Schools participated in the program.

F.S.N.S. Seniors were involved from 1942 - 1946, working under the supervision of a traveling Critic Teacher. In 1943, "Cadets" were assigned placements through centers in Bingham, Guilford, Turner Center, New Portland. By 1944, they worked through centers in Kingfield and Norridgewock and 70 Cadets were in Maine schools that year.

According to the college newspaper, teaching in far flung rural schools with only sporadic visits from a supervisor proved quite challenging: one Cadet, after a series of road-closing blizzards, had to travel to her classroom by horse and sleigh, and another faced a balky woodstove that filled her classroom with smoke.